Early primate a hyperactive, tiny creature

WASHINGTON -- New fossil evidence of the earliest complete skeleton of an ancient primate suggests it was a hyperactive, wide-eyed creature so small you could hold a couple of them in your hand -- if only they would stay still long enough.

The 55 million-year-old fossil dug up in China is one of our first primate relatives and it gives scientists a better understanding of the complex evolution that eventually led to us. This monkey-like creature weighed an ounce or less and wasn't a direct ancestor. Because it's so far back on the family tree it offers the best clues yet of what our earliest direct relatives would have been like at that time, according to a study published yesterday in the journal Nature.

"It's a close cousin in fact," said study author Christopher Beard, curator at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh. He said it is "the closest thing we have to an ancestor of humans" so long ago.

With a trunk only 2.8 inches long, the furry creature was about as small as you can get and still be a mammal, Beard said. Because it was so small and warm-blooded it had to eat bugs and move constantly to keep from losing internal heat, Beard said. That means, Beard said, our earliest primate relatives were "very frenetic creatures, anxious, highly caffeinated animals running around looking for their next meal." -- AP